2024-01-16 10:58:00
The French company Electra – which has 1,000 fast charging points for electric vehicles spread across eight countries – announced on Monday January 15 a fundraising of 304 million euros. In total, over almost three years, almost 600 million euros, after raising 160 million euros in June 2022. This is the second largest fundraising in Europe-wide charging, after that of the German charging network Ionity in November 2021.
The round was led by PGGM, a Dutch pension fund manager. The company was also supported by its historical investors, such as Eurazeo, RIVE Private Investment, and the SNCF group via 574 Invest and Serena. Bpifrance intervenes through its Large Venture fund.
Towards the deployment of 2,200 stations in Europe by 2030
“We are creating a network that is very easy to use so that the transition to electricity is desirable and not a constraint”, explains Aurélien de Meaux, co-founder and CEO of Electra. With this new fundraising, the charging station specialist hopes to deploy 2,200 stations in Europe by 2030, which represents 15,000 charging points. A long-term vision, while the European Union validated, last March, the end of thermal engine cars in 2035 (excluding synthetic fuels).
The company currently claims nearly 100,000 charging sessions per month across its entire network. Its clients include hotels (Kyriad, Novotel, AccorInvest), major retail players (Intermarché, E. Leclerc, Action) but also vehicle rental companies (Sixt, Europcar, Hertz) or motorway rental companies (Vinci). Last March, 16 charging points were installed at the entrance to Toulouse-Blagnac airport (Haute-Garonne). Electra has also established partnerships with taxi, VTC or delivery companies for their supply. The company then makes its margin on the resale of electricity to the customer (0.52 euro/kWh, 0.59 euro on the motorway).
Making recharging “more user-friendly than filling up with gasoline”
With 180 employees, the start-up is finally banking on this fundraising to make the twenty-minute recharge, reserved using an application, “more user-friendly than a full tank of gas”. It recently deployed the “Autocharge” function across its entire fleet, making it possible to automatically identify a customer’s vehicle as soon as it plugs in, without them having to take out their bank card for billing.
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